The Evil Eye

A series of mildly unfortunate events over the last few days, including a runny nose turned hacking cough turned laryngitis, turned me mute today.
As Dave was leaving he debriefed the wee three that I "Lost my voice" which was unfortunate because then Clara cooed to me every 30 minutes or so "Have you found your voice yet Mommy?", which was cute the first 20 times and then not so much.

After Dave left, I could see the kids hovering in the corner for their standard post breakfast conference on how they were going to align forces and trick me into giving them candy and TV access all day. Max came over and said, "So you can't talk at all?". To which I nodded Yes. To which he recorded my affirmative answer mentally (feigning concern in his facial expression and body stance) and went back to advise his underlings of my status. Did I see looks of empathy as they glanced back at me from the corner? No, it was more like a look of victory as if they were certain that, as a result of my inability to talk, all their dreams were going to come true today. Clearly plans for a coup were in place and it was just a matter of time.
When Max got home from school at noon he started sassing about some sort of theory, that if I couldn't answer him when he asked to watch the TV, then that meant it was OK for him to watch TV. Then Clara and Zoe chimed in with "TV TV TV TV TV!"
So as I became increasingly frustrated with my inability to bark out my standard responses to discord, ("1..2...3 timeout"; "Enough!", "Stop fighting!" "You people are driving me crazy!") I brought out the big guns and employed the technology of the EVIL EYE which must have been super evil looking as it restored harmony for nearly 10 minutes and from there on out, we seemed to cycle in and out of harmony, infighting and evil eye dispensements until dave came home at 5:32:05.

And now I'm cranky and weary and must go to sleep...